Grixis Control

Should definitely be bringing in surgical for both storm and KCI, no reason to keep bolt in- you're not going to burn them out quick enough for it to be more relevant than potentially blowing them out with a well targeted surgical.

Bolt is mainly to answer Trawler. Still, it's possible Bolt could be cut for Surgicals. I'm undecided on the matter.

so, how do you guys beat hollow one? i'm not seeing it enough to commit slots especially to that matchup, but when i see it, I close to never win. the matchup is horrible. I can answer most of their threats but die to leftovers (Bloodhgast or Phoenix). Surgical doesnt bother Hollow One and Angler, Anger of the Gods misses them, damnation cant keep bloodghasts and phoenix down
..

i'm at a loss tbh. short of Leyline of the void out of SB, i see no path to victory

You can run Anger of the Gods over Damnation as a hedge against Hollow One, and we do have a few MD answers to their big guys (K-Command, Terminate, Dreadbore). But you're pretty much on the money; that deck is kind of built to crap on interaction by hitting from as many angles as possible.

I am happy we are so lively. I have been running 2 surgicals and 2 nihil spellbomb, but its pretty inconsistent. In addition to Hollow One, I have notice that Living End, KCI, and Dredge have been creeping up on MTGO, at least. I have been considering Leyline of the Void. Anyone else have thoughts or experience?

I actually have been pretty unimpressed with Anger and Surgical as sideboard options. For Anger, it's usually boarded in versus the go-wide decks like Humans or Elves, or against the graveyard decks. Against the wide-strategies, it usually just gets used as a 1-for-1 or a 2-for-1 at best, because the deck has so much removal and people play around it. It could just as easily be another value card like Electrolyze 90% of the time.

I am also relatively more conservative with siding in Surgical Extraction. I join in the opinion that it's the most over-sideboarded card in Modern. The only deck that I bring it in against that doesn't run graveyard cards is Tron, and even that is a concession to me having a lot of chafe. Most combo decks you can just rely on your countermagic to keep them in check. Tron is now on the downswing due to Dampening Sphere being in more sideboards. The only matchup where Lelyline is probably worse is Storm, since they can bounce Leyline before going off. I also am running Serum Visions over Thought Scour so there is less incentive to keep Surgical.

Yeah. I understand that. The argument for Leyline is that against those unfair graveyard matches, most of the time you just cant keep a good grixis control 7 and need to mulligan to hate. And for decks like Hollow One, Living End, and Dredge, one piece of hate is not going to help most of the time; rather you need have multiple forms of hate in your opening hand. Talking about topping Leyline later in the game does not really apply when you likely arent making it past turn 1-2 draws, and your opponent has already abused the graveyard. So instead of hoping to chain hate cards, why not just mull to a game winning card in those match ups.

Put differently, if you accept that Surgical isn't that great against Tron or non-graveyard based combo (e.g. look at @Tiemuuu's sboard plan against Storm), is it worth switching Surgical and Nihil Spellbomb to Leyline if Hollow One, Storm, Living End, and Dredge continue to creep up in meta-share? (The counterarguments I can think of are hyper-geometric distributions, overvaluing the impact of Leyline, meta is not that bad, etc.) And as a corollary, do people feel Surgical is a good sideboard card insofar that it converts unfavorable matchups to fair or good ones? (Sure it may help when 1 or 2 matches from time to time, but if we are just converting a 25% match-up to a 40%, why not just devote the sideboard slot to something more effective, in the same way some people eschew burn hate, for example?)

Played this at fnm, I went 3/1
Round one I played against mill: got demolished game one, game two I was able to control with discard, and game three was awesome!!! Game three opp archive traps me and I drop a turn 1 gurmag angler and ride it to victory.
Round two I played against eldrazi tron, I kinda hoped to ignore the tron matchup and I feel now after the tourney I could devote more sideboard to it and be fine.
Round 3 I played against devoted druid with naya colors and had mono removal and planeswalkers, couldnt be a better matchup.
Round 4 I played against affinity and the 4 kolaghan's command did work.

Some thoughts are most lists people are playing are vastly different but I wanted to chime in and say this list I like a lot. I only have 2 snapcasters that's why I'm playing gearhulk and vryn's prodigy so I still have 4 of those effects. I don't think I'm ever playing a black deck without 4 liliana of the veil. Mind sculptor was also very good, being able to fateseal and close out some games. I didn't get to play against jund, which I'd really like to test. I'm sure I need some spreading seas in the board, and I don't have any field of ruin so that's why they're excluded. I really liked having a flawless manabase and it really helped with consistency. Plus, with my games against tron field of ruin might not have even mattered. He had natural tron game 1 and turn 1 expedition map game 2 into turn 3 tron. Without huge changes to the main deck, what are some suggestions on sideboard?

Trying to keep this list together and play it for a few weeks as I have a tendency to tinker like crazy before getting a valid sample size.

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated!

8 cantrips seems quite high to me.

I take it you're just giving up the tron match up?
0 land destruction anywhere just seems a bit brave IMO. Only having 2 Damping Sphere doesn't seem enough.
I also feel this line up is very weak to dredge, with no anger of the gods.

@Gods_Shadow: how much do you value the Liliana of the Veil in your build? I have been digging LtlH, but have been hesitant to embrace the Veil. I guess the deciding factor for me is that my build is less proactive.

I've put away the countersqualls for sideboard and the collective brutalities are now main.

I was frequently dying without having the chance to cast my 8 commands, so I had to cut 1 kolaghan's and 1 cryptic and added 2 cantrips.

As I am now playing lower to the ground, I took out the thought scours and reduced tasigur to a single copy, swapping the other one for a Kalitas.

I'm using 3x opts and 3x serum visions and now I won't mulligan as often, and finding sideboard pieces is kinda easier.

Tribute to hunger is a pet card of mine, I enjoy having maindeck answer for hexproof fellas, emrakuls and other enormous creatures in general.

I'm enjoying the Anger of the gods instead of the damnation, but I dislike the mana requirements...

I'm not having any trouble against other control decks, except of course UR control, which is a nightmarish match-up. I have now a pretty strong sideboard against tron, so I'm sleeping a lil more peacefuly...
Any thoughts are welcome!

I feel pretty good about this deck and its current position in the meta; it beats up on humans, jeskai control, as well as the other creature decks that are cropping up to play against hollow one/humans. Due to Tasigur and Field of Ruin, I also believe it has a better game against tron than the current crop of Snapcaster mage decks in the meta.

Would you guys be interested in a tournament report/ discussion of specific choices?